I AM A SONIC BOOMER, NOT A SENIOR... In this blog, I am writing to and for those who believe that the Boomers will change what the word Senior means. I also believe that Boomers will change what retirement means in our society. The blog is also for those who are interested in what life after retirement may look like for them. In this blog I highlight and write about issues that I believe to be important both for Seniors and working Boomers.

Monday, November 25, 2013

A good reason to work longer

Researchers at INSERM, the French government’s health research agency, studied 429,000 retirees in France who were formerly self-employed and discovered that their risk of having a diagnosis of dementia was reduced by 3.2% for each extra year they worked before retirement.

“In other words, all other risk factors being equal, those who retired at 65 years old had a 14.6% lower risk of getting dementia than those who retired at 60,” the scientist who led the study, Carole Dufouil, told me.

The link between later retirement and dementia was a bit stronger for men than women, she added.

“We were not surprised by the results, but we were surprised by the robustness of the findings,” Dufouil said. “Still, we need to be cautious as these results might not be generalizable. But this should encourage further research on the topic.”

More Reason to Stay Cognitively Active

Heather Snyder, Ph.D., director of scientific operations at the Alzheimer’s Association, says this new finding is another example of the importance of staying “cognitively active” as long as possible.

This study adds to the body of work that says doing things to continue keeping your brain active may be beneficial at reducing the risks of dementia,” Snyder said.

In the past, the idea of staying mentally engaged tended to mean things like doing the Sunday crossword puzzle, taking classes and reading. But the notion of working longer to fend off Alzheimer’s is fairly new.

Similar Study of Men, Work and Dementia

The French analysis echoes a 2009 study of 382 British male dementia patients by Cardiff University and the Institute of Psychiatry, King’s College London. Those researchers found that every extra year that men worked beyond age 65 postponed the onset of their dementia symptoms by nearly six weeks.

Dufouil said looking at the two studies together provides “further evidence to the hypothesis that intellectual stimulation throughout life might protect against dementia by either preventing it or delaying it.”

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At a workshop I was doing recently I was asked a question, “is pneumonia contagious” I thought it was but I was not sure, but I had pneumo...

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About Me

I was raised on Vancouver Island and in 1965, left to become a charter student of Simon Fraser University I graduated with a degree in Economics and Commerce in 1969; got on with life and then 25 years later graduated with my Masters in Educational Technology from City University in Seattle.

I started teaching in Surrey in 1973, but in 2000, I also started teaching at the University of Phoenix, Vancouver Campus. I became Area Chair for Curriculum and Instruction in 2005 but within four years, Phoenix closed its Vancouver Campus. I fully retired in 2012.

I served on the Board of SHARE Family & Community Services. The Society is a non- profit, independent, community based organization providing leadership and programs in response to the social needs of the residents of the Tri-Cities. I currently write a blog about issues important to Boomers as well as a blog about Personalized Gift Giving